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Thursday, May 12, 2005


The Beatles sixth american LP on Capitol "Beatles VI" included two Larry Williams songs: "Dizzy Miss Lizzie" (changed from "Dizzy Miss Lizzy") and "Bad Boy". Both songs were recorded on the same day 40 years ago: May 10, 1965. This is a picture of my lp copy. The Beatles look like dorks on this cover by the way...obviously they were playing into the stereotypical image of the clean cut Beatles.. they would soon tire of being marketed this way...just how fake this marketing of the beatles was- primarily in order for them to sell records particularly in a still very conservative america- is revealed in any decent Beatles bio (check out philip norman's "Shout!" for example): the beatles spent their key formative time in 1960 and 1961 learning how to play rock and roll in seedy clubs in hamburg, germany frequented by prostitutes and cut-throats....as norman writes: "...Hamburg, more than London or even Paris, was a city of breathtaking wickedness. British soldiers stationed in West Germany brought back tales of entertainments purveyed by the Reeperbahn, Hamburg's legendary cabaret district- of women wrestling in mud, and sex displays involving pythons, donkeys and other animal associates.".....this, not just hamburg but the reeperbahn, is where the beatles made it.. before going to hamburg - a city they conquered- they were by all accounts terrible and could barely play their instruments....in hamburg their garb was black leather not dress shirts and ties! they consumed amphetamines managing to sleep a few hours a night in a squalid room between five or six shows a night honing their skills playing from the rock and roll songbook: songs like carl perkins "honey don't" or chuck berry's "too much monkey business".. this part of the beatles story has largely been expunged from the official record.. its of course far more sordid, interesting and believable than the white bread myth...

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